City Council meeting for September 17, 2019

City Council meeting for September 17, 2019

Happy anniversary to the United States Constitution!!!

The Council:
Mayor Bradi Diaz-Present
Joann Courtland-Present
Fred Chavez-Absent
Dan Yancey-Absent
Jay Manning-Present
Kirby Lack-Present
Marc Payne-Present

Place 3 Candidates
Jayme Sigler- Present
Dario Eubank-Absent

Place 4 Candidates
Matt Russell- Present
Benjamin Beck- Absent

                                                                                                                                                                    Place 5 Candidates                                                                         

Dianne Campbell- Present                             
Gary Kent- Absent

Place 7 (Unexpired Term) Candidates
Jack Smith-Present
Terri Deans-Present

The Agenda for September 17, 2019

Citizen's Forum

The Mayor started things off letting everyone know that due to recent legislation passed by the Governor, there will start being time alloted during each Action Item for citizens to speak about that Action Item. This is a new thing though, so please be patient during the learning curve.

Alicia Menard, President of the Chamber of Commerce, gave some CoC updates to the Council and citizens. Among them – the Military Affairs Dinner will be this Thursday at the Civic Center, and the next one will be Oct 26^th. There will be a Ribbon Cutting for “Lasting Memories” on Sept 24 at Pacific Tanning. This Saturday, they will be hosting their Gallop or Trot 5k at the Civic Center. Sept 26 at Camp Caylor, they will be hosting their mixer which will be sponsored by Cove Nursing and Rehab. On Oct 7, they will be hosting a political forum for the upcoming city council election. That will take place at the Technology Center – informally known as the City Council Chamber.

Terri Deans got up and spoke about disaster preparation and classes being held in the area that are free. For more information, contact Teresa Deans, or contact us and we can get you in touch with her.

Consent Agenda

The routine items that are usually reserved for the Consent Agenda were all passed 4-0 except for the fifth one. The first two were for meeting minutes. The 3rd was an interlocal agreement with Copperas Cove Independent School District and the Police Department for policing services. The 4th is for another interlocal agreement with CCISD to share facilities between each other. The 5th item was for a food service contract with C & H Hawaiian Grill. Councilman Payne recused himself because he has business dealing with them, but since there were only three voting councilman and thus a lack of a quorum it was tabled until the next council meeting.

Public Hearing

Duran Homes Inc. is requesting the the properties  located at 101 and 103 East Ave C be re-designated in the Future Land Use Plan from Retail and LD (Low Density) to HD (High Density Residential). He wants to build a 1600 square foot home. There were no speakers. Vote to pass 4-0.

There was supposed to be a public hearing and vote to adopt the 2019 Comprehensive Plan Update. Councilman Payne asked for it to be tabled until October 15 to give him a chance to complete his reading of it.

Action Items

The are two appointments for the Economic Development Corporation before the city council this evening. There were seven applicants for the council to consider. Out of those persons Richard Kirkpatrick and Jay Jackson were nominated and passed 4-0.

Mike Creagle was nominated on a resolution to the Lampasas County Central Appraisal District Board Of Directors by a vote of 4-0.

Justin Carothers, Bradi Diaz, Teresa Johnson, Jay Manning, and Bob Weiss was nominated on a resolution to the Coryell County Central Appraisal District Board Of Directors by a vote of 4-0.

The council authorized the City Manager to execute an agreement with Bell County Water Control District #1 for composting material chipping and removal and general site maintenance of the City's composting site. Vote to pass 4-0.

The long range financial planning document called the 2019 Capital Outlay Plan was amended to add and additional irrigation pump at the golf course. The cost is $14,522. If it is not replaced the other one will fail before its end of life cycle. Vote to pass 4-0.

The 2019 amended Personnel Improvement Plan to show the Budget Technician position with a pay rate of $27.62 per hour. Vote to pass 4-0.

The council debated a resolution to support State Highway ramp project. It would be 100 percent grant funding. This would redirect commercial traffic from Clark Rd to Tank Destroyer. It also would include a left turn point to allow Copperas Cove residents to safely turn on Tank Destroyer and return to Copperas Cove. The resolution passed 4-0. Editorial Comment: Terri Deans spoke up in favor of this resolution for safety reasons. She IS the first to speak out in council under provisions of HB2840.

The Chamber of Commerce and the City are looking to allow the Military Affairs Committee to use the Civic Center four times a year an no more than once a month free of charge in exchange for Copperas Cove receiving a table for the dinner. Vote to pass 4-0.

FATHOM

Ryan started the update by referring back to the previous in which the council had authorized 2 meter reader service technician positions. As of today, both positions are filled, and are out working. They have received training, still have a little training to receive, but are out working now. Fathom and the City are still working together to improve response and customer service. Brad Drier then stepped up to give his update.

-Total Calls still hover in the 2,800 range that it's been in since the last update

-Total Abandoned calls has gone from 1.56% to 2% between July and August,

-The average speed of answer has gone from 12 seconds to 26 seconds from July to August

-On a 5 point scale, customer satisfaction has stayed around 4.78 since the last update

-Call Resolution has maintained around 97% during the last two months

They've made some changes in support, so now from a support standpoint for the City of Copperas Cove, they have a Operations Business Manager who has a lead, 6 Dedicated Reps, and an Analyst. On top of that, they have a “peak team” that acts as floaters and step in to help where it is needed. Peak time is typically at the beginning and end of the month.

They also now have a new Director of Operations who's managing the Regional Directors. They have a Director of Data Management, they have given the City Direct access to some of the info that Fathom has so the City can access that directly, and they have also brought on a Searchable Knowledge base for Fathom which is where they can look up the city policies and business practices from the computer while the rep is on a call.

In regards to calls, they are working on looking at how they can drive the call volume down. One of the key things they are doing is looking at escalations and what's causing them and what the outcome is. If a customer calls in and says they aren't happy and want to talk to someone else, they log that call and why it was escalated to another person. A lot of them are regarding disconnections, move outs, and payment return. In Copperas Cove, the escalations are less than 1/2% of all their calls. Mayor Diaz asked Brad why her tenants are calling Fathom to ask what's going on, and Fathom is telling them they need to go to their landlord for answers. Brad didn't have any answers for her, but said he would be in touch with her and look into it. Mayor Diaz said the feeling she's getting from her tenants is the Fathom reps are going down their scripted answers to resolve the issue, and if none of those work, then they are referring tenants to the landlord. Brad stated he will dig further into that for her.

Thursday and Friday of this week, they will be implementing an Mobile Data Collection System. It's a driveby system for the AMI software that isn't transmitting wirelessly like it should be. The are also continuing to provide additional training to the city staff for the work order management system, customer billing, and the AMI software. The registration rate through the online customer portal has increased by 2% in the past 3 months, setting us at 54% - which is great.

Jay Manning asked about the excess calls and the cost associated. He wanted to know if that's something they'd be willing to renegotiate. Brad said that as per the contract, yes there is a fee for call overages. However, as you know, they haven't done that in the past 10 months. He believes there's more work to be done to reduce those numbers and address it as a partner with the City. He said the contract is out of his control, but he's an advocate for Copperas Cove in trying to work with Fathom.

Kirby Lack brought up that a long time ago, they used to be able to call the City around the Holidays and inquire about families who are behind on a water bill and pay it off. It was typically a thing churches would do. Is there still a way to do that? Brad excitedly said he doesn't know, but he would love to look into it and see if there's a way to make it happen. Brad did bring up that the city has access to the system and they can look into that as well. Ryan stated that if someone comes in and says they want to pay a bill, the city will never stop them from doing that as long as they have identification needed for the form of payment. As far as city staff identifying those individuals – the city would never allow that nor would they authorize Fathom to do that because it is a privacy issue. Kirby responded that the city never told them who they were helping – it would just be something like the city saying, yes we have a bill here for $150 – would you like to pay it and then the church would pitch in towards that bill. They never knew who they were helping out, and the customer was never told who helped them out (which was good to keep them from begging for more). Ryan brought up that there ARE organizations that are provided to customers who help customers with their bills. He would be willing to provide that list and the churches can donate to the organizations if they would like.

Joanne Courtland asked what will happen if in 6 months we are still having issues and the call volume is still as high as it is now? Brad went over multiple things they are working on with the online program to promote more and more people using it, and making it easier to use which should help drop that call volume down.

With that, the Fathom Update came to a close. There were no items for executive session and the meeting came to a close.